Late in August, nine women from the UN Program of International Caucus attended the annual NGO Conference at the United Nations in New York City. We had a disproportinately large presence compared to other non-governmental organizations which participated. Something to be very proud of! The WCA artists were energetically engaged, showing up at as many sessions as they were able to, and enthusiastically getting together informally to discuss issues. For those who were attending a UN event for the first time, it was an overwhelming experience to try to absorb the ideas that seem to come from every direction at once. A UN conference is a deep immersion in pressing issues of the world. Representing WCA were: Alli Berman, Maureen Burns-Bowie, Liz Di Giorgio, Mary Hamill, Simone Kestelman, Madeleine Segall-Marx, Neda Moridpour, Mary Neubauer, Martha Nicholson.Madeleine has written a moving report of her experiences:From August 27-29 several members of the Women’s Caucus for Art had the opportunity to attend the DPI/NGO Conference at the United Nations. There are over 1,300 NGOs associated with the UN’s Department of Public Information, and this year, 902 were in attendance. A tsunami! Quoting the conference’s Concept Note, the purpose of this meeting was to “harness the strategies, expertise and resources across the broadest spectrum of civil society to move poverty eradication, sustainability, human rights and climate justice into the mainstream discourse, and spark sustained public demand for lasting political action in support of an ambitious outcome from the Post-2015 sustainable development process.” This is indeed ambitious - the doing, and the inculcation into the consciousness of “regular people” of the importance of these issues, making the world aware that time is of the essence. Needless to say, there was plenty to listen to, much to be thought about, and opportunity to meet and network with all kinds of people who want to be, and who have already done something about, making the world better. A great pleasure was engaging with fellow artists from WCA. What a potent combination all at one lunch table in the cafeteria!I took notes. It’s a habit. As I cannot share with you the wealth of thought of this conference, I can pluck from my notes some phrases that popped out to me, and list them as I found them, chronologically over those three days. It kept crossing my mind that perhaps I will use these phrases to build a large wall work one day. For now, they seem to me to comprise a poem, which I shall call

Blue PeaceA time of turmoil, but also of tremendous opportunityFreedom from fear and wantWill our shared aspirations be the right ones?The world is a messSay with hope, Good Morning.If you are not named, you are not countedProblems ignore boundariesNon-killing is the greatest religionWaste is an act of violence.Sustainability implies no threat to the futureLifestyle is cause and solutionInequalities are both cause and effect.____ is the most dangerous place to be bornIf you don’t go forward, you are going backwardPlanetary boundariesDefinition of groupsOuter space perspective.If you don’t believe in miracles, then you are not a realistWe send youth into conflict, but they are not mature enough to be invited to peace talks.We the peopleWe the peoples.How they want to live their lives.BIG DATA SCIENCEMining dataCurating dataVisualizing dataApplying data.Poor people are first and most affectedNo time to waitSmall islands are losingWe know there is no Plan B.Carbon neutral worldNever take a knife to a gun fightFrom space the masters of infinityGo directly to net zero approachIce wisdomWater is the nexusWater – daughter - slaughterAsymmetric relational conflict systemBlue peace.Without passion nothing happensWithout compassion the wrong things happenPolitics, profit, powerBold action.Madeleine Segall-MarxSeptember 1, 2014

Congratulations to WCA members Betsy Damon and collaborative duo Louder Than Words as our 2014 International Caucus Honor Roll awardees for their stellar art and activism, which inspires us, as WCA members, to continue to align our work with WCA's role of bringing attention to UN priorities such as gender equality, child health, environmental sustainability, global partnerships, violence against women, women's leadership, and women's economic empowerment.

New Online Gallery for International Caucus Members_____________________________

IC Member Gallery Director Karen Joy

IC member Karen Joy is our new International Caucus Member Gallery Director! Karen has created an online gallery on this website. Another benefit for our current IC members. Thank you Karen! The gallery slideshow is set up to start with a random image in order to give more equal visibility with all artists involved. Viewers may also click on the thumbnail to be taken to a specific larger image. These larger images may be linked to an IC member's preferred URL (website, blog, etc.).

To check to see if you are a current member, please sign in at the national WCA website1) Click on the My Membership tab, 2) Click on theMembership Directory tab, 3)Search for your name to go to you member profile, 4)Check the box on the right for International Caucus and 5) Save.

If you would like to join us, please go to the to the national WCA Join Now page http://www.nationalwca.org/applicants/application.phpComplete the registration, making sure to check the International Caucus box on the right.Read through the national WCA website and this one to learn more about what we are doing!

Current members may send Name, Photo/Title, Website URL, & a One Sentence Description to Karen at WCAIC[at]KarenJoyStudio.com

Experience in China for our Delegates of Half the Sky: Intersections in Social Practice Art Exceeds Expectations____________________________________________

Teaser video by Mido Lee of our Half the Sky: Intersections in Social Practice Art exhibition

Even with over a year of planning for this project, the thirteen Half the Sky: Intersections in Social Practice Art delegates who went to Shenyang were initially unsure what to expect as to the reception of our works and events and about how much participation we would experience from the Chinese artists, professors and students. At this point, we are still processing our experiences and our documentation, but we do know that all of us - our US-based delegation and those Chinese with whom we spoke - were significantly impacted by our time there.

The LuXun Academy of Fine Art Gallery staff told us they had never had as many people show up for an opening as they had for ours. Gallery Director Wang Yi Gang told me that this show and its events held some edginess and caused some discomfort for Chinese viewers, but he believed that these kind of works are important to stimulate conversation and thought, especially around topics of domestic violence and rape. Wei Er Shen, President of LuXun Academy of Fine Arts, called this project's focus on Sino-American women's art and its opportunities for discussion among women unprecedented in China.

During a roundtable discussion with the Chinese artists, an initial reticence on the Chinese side to discuss gender issues eventually softened and we found common experiences and recognition of the need to support each other. At our Cultural and Community Interactions events the next day, individuals - both male and female - asked thoughtful and probing questions and shared stories about the lack of support in China for victims of violence and rape. There was enthusiastic participation in all of the activities.

Prior to our arrival, the delegation had not met as a whole, yet, we worked professionally, respectfully and earnestly together to pull off the multi-day cultural exchange in ways deeply meaningful for each of us. These experiences are being captured in our documentation and will be shared in more detail in the near future. We are all very grateful to those who supported this project back in the States and the artists,essayists and jurors who did not attend, but contributed to the success of the exhibition and the catalog.

“Impressions: Artists Consider the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs)"presented to packed room at UN Commission on the Status of Women Conference 2014________________________________________________________

These women brought professionalism, responsibility, accountability, earnestness and dedication to this project. This is what it takes to pull off an stunning and impactful event. This demonstrates why WCA is an NGO of the UN and how, when we up our game, when we set standards for excellence as artists and activists, the results continue to echo in meaningful ways in our communities and the larger world. — Sherri Cornett

By Patti Jordan The Commission on the Status of Women is a global network dedicated to gender equality and empowerment of women. Each year they hold a conference at UN Headquarters in NY to review progress in the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. Representatives of UN Member States, Civil Society, and UN NGO’s gather, discuss, and make recommendations. In 2013 Sherri Cornett, the Director of International Caucus and Maureen Burns-Bowie presented the Philadelphia Chapter Ragdoll Project at the Artisan Fair at CSW.This year, 2014, Maureen Burns-Bowie, Director of the UN Program of WCA International Caucus, Representative to the UN, and WCA New York Chapter member organized a Parallel Event Presentation held at the UN on March 11th, titled, “Impressions: Artists Consider the Millenium Development Goals” (MDGs). This outstanding and proactive event featured Anne Kantor Kellett, Mary Hamill (WCA New York Chapter members) and Allison Milewski, (WCA and IC member) three women artists whose work addresses concerns addressed in the Millennium Development Goals drafted by the UN. Some of these relevant MDGs include: : eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, universal primary education, gender equality, improved health, environmental sustainability.Visible expressions of these pressing objectives, often photography-based, were evidenced in the works of all three women. Artist Anne Kantor Kellett spoke of “Surviving Surviving.” She is the child of Holocaust survivors and she expressed her sensitivity to other victims of genocide. Kantor Kellett described the burden of survivors as an experience imprinted in memory, present in her evocative painting and sculpture and in her tender photographs of Rwandan refugees. She elucidated that the women survivors of the Rwanda Genocide possess the same look of grief in the their eyes as women Holocaust survivors of Nazism, and that in Rwanda many sites are memorials. Documentary artist and educational reformer Mary Oestereicher Hamill demonstrated how artists can enliven awareness, and that she often chooses to engage her audience rather than lecture - and that she did. Particularly poignant was her Cambodia War Widows Project, a joint project with Khmer Rouge survivior Chath pierSath. This multimedia project records and reinvents the recalled atrocities from the Khmer Rouge killings as well as the hardships in present-day Cambodia. In her documentation we viewed the widows in this marginalized community creating strikingly iconic, fabric-based cyanotypes honoring their dead husbands, thereby documenting and reclaiming lost histories.Allison Milewski presented PhotoForward, a sustainable photography and media-based program she established to empower women multi-generationally. She described how her program encourages girls and women to become storytellers for their own communities, both domestically in cooperation with social workers and youth development programs for girls in foster care, and globally through programs aimed at girls and women from marginalized ethnic groups, such as Laos and Cambodia. Several young women from thePhotoForward and Sanctuary Arts Program were present to share personal stories and photographic visions, culminating in a powerful poetry reading by Meri Northern Lights Marabyan.The evening concluded with stimulating conversation and in-depth insight through an enlivened question-and-answer. A very emotive moment came when women in the audience read aloud quotes from the Cambodian women artists’ PhotoForward project. Delivering on the promise of the Millenium Development Goals and attesting to the inherent success of the event, points were then made as to the urgency to take decisive action and the power of art to express important goals. In keeping with the program’s title, it was truly a Parallel Event in that as these women artists were mutually reinforcing goals, we gained a glimpse of the world through their lens. And we saw that they’re changing the world - one work of art at a time.

Our UN Program to present at the UN Commission on the Status of Women Conference March 11, 2014_______________________________________________

“Impressions: Artists Consider the Millenium Development Goals” has been accepted as a Parallel Event for the 58th United Nations Comission on the Status of Women Conference which will be held March 9-21 in New York City. Three artist/activists from the WCA UN Program will be speaking, Dr. Mary Hamill, Anne Kantor Kellett, and Allison Milewski. The presentation, planned by Maureen Burns-Bowie, UN Program Director, will take place on Tuesday, March 11 at 6:15. It will be located in the Church Center, Boss Room, 8th floor, 777 UN Plaza, New York City. The conference if free and open to the public. All WCA members are welcome and encouraged to participate in the conference. For any inquiries, contact Maureen. wca.un.mbb(at)gmail.com

The UN Program of the International Caucus is producing a video to showcase meaningful work by the following WCA artists, who are focused on bringing attention to issues which the UN has prioritized. Samples of these works can be found in the slide show above. The videographer is Jodie Childers, a Creative Writing professor at City University of New York and documentary filmmaker. Members of WCA whose work is represented: Seda Baghdassarian Saar, Alli Berman, Maureen Burns-Bowie, Sherri Cornett, Linda Coughlin, Betsy Damon, Liz DiGiorgio, Joanna Fugliniti, Mary Hamill, Marjorie Wood Hamlin, Carole Richard Kaufman, Anne Kantor Kellett, Simone Kestelman, Sheri Klein, Ikie Kressel, Allison Milewski and artists from PhotoForward, Eva Preston, Negin Sharifzadeh, Bonnie Jean Smith, Helaine Soller, Elizabeth Sowell-Zak, Joyce Ellen Weinstein.

In February, the International Caucus will celebrate two years of moving beyond a small international committee primarily focused on the United Nations, to a large, thriving, active group that brought WCA a collaborative exhibition in South Korea in October 2012, is well into development of our exhibition and cultural exchange to occur in China in April and has expanded our United Nations involvement significantly through its UN Program committee. Join us in Chicago to celebrate, learn about each other in real time and plot our future. The conference is anchored at the Essex Hotel, near the CAA conference center at the Hilton and just south of the Art Institute of Chicago. Full WCA conference programming, including the ever-important Lifetime Achievement Awards, art tours and panels as well as registration may be found at http://www.nationalwca.org/conference/currentconfer.php. Exclusive Early Bird Package is available until January 6th. Here are some highlights for the International Caucus. Check back for updates.

Half the Sky Art-Making - Sandra Mueller and Sherri Cornett will be facilitating this opening event for us to share with each other how we, as WCA members, support women's, social and environmental issues. Small art objects will be created to travel to the China for the Half the Sky: Intersections in Social Practice exhibition. Essex Park East Gallery9:15 – 10:00 am

Spectrum Bus Tour of three WCA related exhibitions at the Korean Cultural Center, Robert Morris Gallery and ARC Gallery